I’m almost 41 weeks with our rainbow baby and would be so grateful if you could pray for us. As each day goes on, patience is tougher, fear increases and I’m trying to stay close to God but it’s tough.

I’m infant baptized 22F have been civically married to my husband since I was 19 we went to the courthouse signed paperwork and came back 3 days later and eloped with 2 random people who were our witnesses, we had whataburger after. I recently Reverted and started studying Catholicism about 2 years ago now I’ve baptized my baby I’ve gone to mass I did a bunch of invalid confessions because “currently not in a state of grace” due to us not being married in the church I only found out that we were fornicating when my priest brought it up I’m so grateful he did because I thought I was doing the right thing skipped the whole dating scene get married young buy a house have children but I’m grateful that he brought that to my attention so I’ve tried to be patient over these past nine months and a few weeks ago our priest sent a letter to the bishop asking for his approval since my husband isn’t a baptized Catholic but we can pray for that separately. I know once I get married in the church I will be in a state of Grace after my first valid confession. And can receive the Eucharist for the first time. am I allowed to wear a beautiful dress when I get my marriage, blessed as a sacrament (convalidation). Is it selfish of me to want to buy a wedding dress and I feel beautiful when I get my marriage into the eyes of God maybe it means nothing I know I’m still so young but I would just love to wear a dress but maybe it’s overstepping because I’m already used and broken/ those are only for women who are getting married. I don’t know if it’s gonna be a ceremony a small little blessing maybe something I can invite some of my mom friends too. Has anybody been through the process?

Not sure how to begin the post other than just jump right into it, I suppose. I have a perfect 6 month old baby girl and a highly spirited 5 year old girl at home. The second postpartum period has been infinitely harder and I'm barely hanging on by a very thin thread. Most days I feel like I'm a light breeze away from breaking down crying. I'm tired from broken sleep (the first one slept pretty solidly from early on, whereas with the second one we're lucky to get a 5 hour stretch after several bedtime false starts, and we're on 3 naps a day because baby tops out at 2h awake). I have no motivation or energy to tidy, organize, or clean anything and the clutter and mess paralyze me with overwhelm. I have 3 people needing to use my brain, so the decision fatigue is intense, which makes it feel impossible to think about meal planning, or even just planning a single day's dinner.

I have very little support outside of my husband. My parents are always willing to help, but they're aging and have their own health concerns, so I don't want to ask too much of them. Other family members who live in town lead very busy lives that don't leave much room for any significant help coming our way.

All of this makes me very irritable with the 5 year old, who just does normal 5 year old things for a kid who is still adjusting to a new sibling and preparing for a new school year and is seeing her mother have a very hard time but doesn't know how to process it. I know I need to have grace with her and help her regulate her feelings, but instead I lash out because I can't regulate my own feelings.

I also feel incredibly dry spiritually. I am a convert of just over 6 years and I've noticed my fervor drop over time and dwindle to almost nothing. Prayer has always been hard for me and just feels like talking to the walls. The few Catholic friends I had started to make turned into one sided relationships and I got tired of always having to reach out, and of feeling like a second thought. The isolation has been hard on both my husband and I, as we've had similar experiences.

At the advice of my doctor, I am looking into the mental health resources available through my work benefits. I'm not really asking for anything other than prayers, I guess. Mostly just wanted to share my thoughts into the void.

I’m asking for prayers, please. I’ve been trusting in God’s timing and His guidance quite faithfully for years. I’m reaching a point where I feel a big change coming, and it may be difficult. I am struggling quite a bit on hearing Him and knowing which direction He would have me go. I know what path I think is right for me, but I’m struggling because in it may be a sin.

I know this all sounds vague, I am in therapy working on my thought processes and honestly I just want to know that I’m not going against what God wants for me. I know it probably sounds like I’m overthinking it, but I grew up with a skewed understanding of Christianity. Any prayers, scripture / reading suggestions would be appreciated.

No advice wanted. We’ve seen it all. Books, friends, family, professional nanny friend, the pediatrician, even did an occupational therapy referral. Reading lots of books about the potty, watching the Daniel Tiger episodes about needing to go potty at school.

My kid is fully potty trained at home & if she’s out and about with me or her dad. We just started a new school and she won’t go at school. School policy is that she needs to be fully potty trained, no ifs, ands, or buts. Which is understandable. We need her in school so that I can work, and also, she LOVES school. But she’s going to get kicked out if she keeps having accidents, and I don’t know how to make her understand that and use it as motivation.

Part of the problem is that she doesn’t want to go potty without me, her mom. But how am I, her mom, supposed to fix that?

At this point we just need divine intervention (or maybe just time to process & consistent consequences… nah divine intervention PLEASE.)

Hi! Title says it all lol I’m looking for faith-related gift ideas for a friend’s Convalidation ceremony. TIA!!

I've noticed the Enneagram is used in many Protestant churches while other denominations tend to stay away. How does the Catholic Church view it generally? Is there any acceptance or rejection of the Enneagram on a wide scale?

Just as an FYI, I am a newly returning Catholic so am curious.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my vocation and whether marriage and children are still part of my path. I’m getting older, stopped dating about a year ago after the dumpster fire of dating apps, and while I’m still open to marriage, I’m no longer putting myself “on the market” (on those apps) at the expense of my peace.

One thing I’ve become increasingly certain about is that I don’t want sex outside of marriage anymore. Looking back on my past, I can see how sexual sin drew me away from God, even though at the time I enjoyed it and didn’t see it that way. I’m divorced now (my 10+ year relationship was never in the Church), and I’ve repented and am trying to live differently.

I’m finding that I have a much stronger desire now to guard my soul and live according to what the Church teaches about chastity. Even if I don’t know whether marriage or children are in my future, I want to be faithful to God with whatever vocation He has for me.

For the Catholic women here: How have you discerned vocation, especially when you’re open to marriage but no longer actively dating? And how have you approached chastity and dating after a past that you regret?

I’m 26 years old and have been with my boyfriend a year. Before me, he lived a very groundless, lost life. Partied a lot in college, slept around (he doesn’t know how many girls he’s slept with but he said he’d “guess the upper 20s”).
Since dating me, my boyfriend says I’ve brought him closer to God. He’s joined OCIA at our local parish. I’ve witnessed how much he’s changed the last year. But I cannot even put into words how utterly devastating it is to know he’s been with so many girls. It makes me feel insecure, not special, anxious. Has anyone been with someone and been able to move past this? I don’t know if I can. It’s genuinely heartbreaking and causes intrusive thoughts all the time. I hate it so so much. I’m also worried about STIs/STDs. He’s been tested and never had one but I know herpes and HPV aren’t tested for. I just feel so disgusted at his past and I know he can’t change it but I also can’t change how I feel about it. Any advice??? Prayers? Any novenas to saints that could help????? Just so heartbroken right now.

I’m too fatigued to even talk about it. I need any and all advice. I’ve been praying to God how to handle it but I’m at the point of breaking and I have no love anymore. Our vows promised a Catholic life but everytime I’ve prayed he’s headed in the opposit direction. He just said he’ll financially never support the Church or anything g Catholic when I asked to go to Fulton Sheen’s beautification.

There’s many other examples I can give but I feel like I failed my daughters.

Any advice for how to fill the void? I guess when I got married it felt peaceful that we could have a Catholic life. Now he’s an anti Catholic presentation (coming from non denominational background). Priests have tried to step in with how to help. It he shoots their help down because “they’re just Catholic,” so their arguments don’t matter.

I’m just overwhelmed and i guess I’ve been so in love with my faith recently. He won’t even read a faith book with me if it’s by a Catholic writer.

Any advice? Anyone in a similar situation?

I’m so unhappy and I have such regret being unhappy secretly in front of my two babies.

Any others in this boat? How do you navigate your (presumably unwanted) attractions? Lack of romance? Feeling different? Any sadness that comes with it?

Please, only replies from other women who experience this. Thank you.

Husband and I got married in March. We just moved into our house a couple of weeks ago. Because we’re in the south, I want to take up a few new hobbies such as shooting/hunting and gardening. Every time I bring it up he finds some way to discourage me from it, usually making the reason money related. He is so obsessed with money. He’s very greedy and prideful is has no self awareness. I always pray for him that he realizes his flaws. But it doesn’t seem like that so far. He seems to only support my tradwife like hobbies which are cleaning and cooking for him, which I love doing but the days get very repetitive. Idk I just wanted to vent. I don’t like venting to my mom or friends about marriage stuff because I don’t want them to have a bad impression of my husband. So I feel like my feelings are bottled up.

Sorry it’s long :/// I need some advice because this situation is really hard for me. I have a cousin who is literally like a sister to me, and she’s also been my best friend for years. We used to talk all day, every day—literally!
The problem is that she’s a very negative person. She’s constantly gossiping, criticizing people, and keeping up with other people’s lives. She even has a fake Instagram account that she uses to stalk people. She used to stalk all of my exes and people from my past, which I absolutely hated. Eventually, I had to tell her to stop.
When I decided to give my life to Christ, I started distancing myself from her and eventually stopped talking to her completely. A big reason was the negativity. I would wake up in the morning and the first text I’d get from her would be gossip about someone or some kind of bad news. I honestly hated starting my day like that.
I’m not going to sit here and act like I never talk negatively about anyone because obviously I’m not perfect. But I personally don’t like talking about people or keeping up with people’s lives to the extent that she does. Since I’ve been trying to get closer to God, I’ve realized that I don’t want that kind of energy constantly surrounding me.
There are also some things that make me uncomfortable. Sometimes I’ll tell her about my plans and then something ends up going wrong. I know that could completely be a coincidence, but it has happened enough times that I’ve started feeling uncomfortable sharing certain things with her. There have also been multiple times where I’ll buy something and then she’ll buy the exact same thing or something very similar. I don’t necessarily mind that, but combined with everything else, it sometimes feels strange to me.
My mom has always told me that she thinks my cousin is a hater and that I should stop telling her so much about my personal life. I’ve always struggled with that because, at the same time, my cousin has genuinely been there for me when nobody else was. She has supported me during some really difficult moments, and I will always appreciate that.
But lately, whenever I talk to her, I feel completely drained afterward. I feel like she takes so much of my energy with all the negativity, gossip, and constantly keeping up with what other people are doing. Sometimes I literally feel weighted down after getting off the phone with her.
I also feel guilty because I love her, and she really is like a sister to me. But I’m starting to wonder if loving someone means I have to continue giving them the same level of access to my life.
I’ve been thinking about either distancing myself from her again or possibly cutting her out of my life completely, but I honestly don’t know if that’s the right thing to do.

I’m struggling with this lately because my husband and I are 13 cycles in ttc.

I’ve prayed much about this but wanted to know if other Catholics/women had insight. I honestly need to talk to a priest.

We are obviously anti-IVF alongside church teachings. But my question is about God’s will. Each person on earth is here intentionally - it was God’s will that they are here. So even babies conceived through IVF - God allows them to be here. But let’s say IVF wasn’t used to conceive a specific baby - would they still be here? Because obviously they serve a purpose in this world. But let’s say IVF didn’t exist - would God still ensure that person would exist, born naturally to their mother? Or would they simply not exist on this earth, because the only way they would be here is IVF?

Sorry if this is confusing. I’m struggling through the complexities and maybe this is something we as humans just can’t know

Hi! I’m pretty desperate for help so I have turned to Reddit for support. My fiancé and I were working with our local church to complete our marriage prep a year ago, for our upcoming wedding in October. The church we are getting married at (out of diocese) says they never received the approval that it was completed. When I reached out to our home church, through various miscommunications, they claim we never completed marriage prep and recommended we reach out to the cathedral for emergency help. Well, we did and thought we were okay, but now the priests at both churches are refusing to sign off on our consent forms - the cathedral saying it’s not their responsibility to sign and the home church saying we didn’t do all the required work (the cathedral is saying we did). I’m sorry this is so rambly but with my wedding being a month away I’m desperate for help and at a total loss of what to do or how to get this one piece of paper signed which really is the only thing holding us back. I’ve never been so upset. All we want is to be able to have this sacrament but it’s being held up by churches pointing fingers.

My husband and I are coming up on our one-year anniversary this weekend. We’ve been using NFP this past year, and we’ve decided that we’re ready to start TTC this month.
I’m so excited to be a mom. I’m also terrified of giving birth, scared that we might have a hard time conceiving, and overwhelmed by how many unknowns there are. I think a lot of what I’m struggling with is the feeling that so much of this is completely out of my control.
I know these fears are normal, and I’ve been trying to give them to God rather than hold onto them. I’ve also been asking for the intercession of St. Joseph and St. Anne. I won’t ovulate until later in September, so I’m already realizing that TTC might be an exercise in patience and surrender for me.
For those of you who have dealt with anxiety while TTC, what helped you? Are there any prayers, devotions, books, or even practical tools that helped you find peace and genuinely trust God’s will rather than constantly worrying about what might happen?

The second part of this is a little heavier.

About a week ago, I joined the pregnancy subreddit because I thought it might be helpful as we entered this stage of life. I unfollowed it this morning because it felt like every other post I saw was about abortion.
I’ve felt such a deep sadness reading some of the posts and comments, especially seeing how many people support ending a pregnancy for reasons that can sound so casual, like: “We weren’t being careful, but we didn’t think we would get pregnant right away, and now isn’t the right time.”
I’ve prayed for the women and their babies, and I’ve stopped myself from commenting because I know the backlash would be difficult for me to read and probably wouldn’t accomplish anything.
Yesterday at Mass, after receiving Communion, I was struggling not to cry thinking about how many people in the world need prayers and feeling like I could never possibly pray for everyone.
I’ve never struggled with depression before, and I don’t think that’s what this is. The closest word I can find for what I’m feeling is grief.
Over the last year, I’ve been learning so much more about the Catholic faith. I’m a cradle Catholic, but my faith has become much deeper recently, and my nondenominational husband is actually starting OCIA next month. As I’ve grown closer to God, though, I feel like I’ve also become much more aware of the weight of the world and more concerned about the souls of the people I love.
Obviously, I don’t know the true state of anyone else’s soul, and I know that ultimately they belong to God, not me. But I still worry about them.
I feel grief knowing how casually human life can be treated from its very beginning. I feel grief over the possibility that I may struggle to become pregnant myself. I feel grief that some of the people I love don’t have the same zeal for God.
Maybe what I’m really struggling with is learning how to care deeply without feeling like I have to carry everything myself.
Has anyone else experienced something like this as they’ve grown deeper in their faith? How did you learn to surrender the people and situations you couldn’t change to God while still loving them and praying for them?

So this topic has been troubling me for a while and I can’t really find sound theological opinion/explanation on this.

So the catechism says that to the Jews belong the sonship, glory the promises etc (CCC 839). The Church’s understand of Romans 9 and 11 is that Jews still have a covenant with God despite their rejection of the Gospel, for the sake of their forefathers. I understand the point that God’s promises are irrevocable on God’s side.

At the same time we obviously do not believe that this special relationship is salvific. The Church clearly teaches that there is only one route to salvation: Jesus Christ. (Not talking about those with invincible ignorance).

So what does it mean that they are still God’s chosen people? Like practically what does that actually mean. I understand God keeps His promises but what are the promises? That Israel will be saved? But then that makes those promises/covenants salvific which we just established they are not. If they were then that would mean there are two paths to salvation: one through Jesus and one through Jewish bloodline. This is clearly the dual-covenant theology which is a heresy.

I am deeply unsettled by the discourse on this topic. Trying to find the answer through research I only found two different extremes. One, claiming or strongly insinuating that Jews are saved through this covenant while explicitly denying Christ (they add “in a mysterious way only know by God” as if it makes the fact that they just completely minimised Jesus acceptable)
Or the second which from what I’ve seen has only been posted by SSPX (or similar communities). This one completely rejects that Jews still have a covenant with God and also rejects Vatican II and overall “modern Catholicism”.

Either way, I’m not really sure how to square these two teachings myself, and it is bringing a lot of doubt.

Warning this may be long. My husband and I have only been married for a year and one month. We got pregnant right away and immediately my husband started to become a person that I did not agree to marry. Since I had my daughter four months ago, I feel like it started to get worse. My husband doesn’t help me at all. He has no grace or sympathy for me. He goes to work but comes home and does absolutely nothing. My baby doesn’t sleep well at night so I’m very sleep deprived, and for me to keep my sanity, I sleep whenever she sleeps. which is not very much but when she sleeps, she’ll sleep for three hours at a time. But because I sleep when she sleeps, I fall behind on house chores, grocery shopping, etc. And as much as I hate that my husband comes home to a messy house and dinner not ready as soon as he comes home, I just wish that he was able to sympathize with me of how tired I am. Of course I want him to come home to a nice clean house, but I tried to tell him that I can’t do it all by myself. But he uses the excuse that he’s at work all day and that he’s tired too. But he doesn’t help me at night. Sometimes he’ll go to bed at 2 AM just playing video games or watching TV while I’m up with the baby and when I ask for him to help me, all of a sudden he’s tired and he needs to go to bed. He has a 9 to 5 desk job, which is basically a remote job that he does at his brother‘s house since they work for the same company and it’s about a 20 minute commute from our house. When he comes home, he just ignores our daughter and sits on the couch and starts playing video games. I’ll be cooking dinner and she’ll be crying and he won’t acknowledge her. I’ll ask if he could pick her up or change her so I can finish cooking dinner and he’ll just tell me that she’s fine without breaking eye contact with the TV or his phone.

I’m not trying to dismiss the fact that he may be mentally exhausted from work. I’m just trying to paint a picture of how there’s not a lot of physical demand for him to not have the energy to help me with the baby or house chores. And my husband complains all the time about how I do clean or how I even fold his laundry but he doesn’t do any of it himself. I’m not saying that I’m not perfect either. I have been getting really impatient with him and have been saying really mean things about how I think he’s a lazy husband and how I’m no longer open to life with him, etc. I would say that my husband is a very strong and devote Catholic, which is one of the reasons why I fell in love with him. But I feel like he’s been using going to church as an excuse to also not help me. My husband will go to adoration and will be gone for the whole day saying that he was an adoration. He also sings for our church choir so he’ll be gone all day Sunday morning and won’t be home until 4:30 PM because he stayed behind “practicing.”

I will be honest I have been skipping out on church because of how exhausted I have been and I’ve also been getting really intense migraines that happen causing me to have dizzy spells that make me faint and severe nausea. But my husband tells me that is no excuse to miss out on church, which he may be right, but I have to drive myself to church because he’s at choir and I don’t feel safe to drive sometimes.

But today was kind of my last straw. Today is Sunday. I woke up with a severe migraine and a screaming
baby. The pain was so nauseating for me, I woke my husband up and he did not wake up very kindly. I asked him to please take care of our daughter and he did. This was at 9:30 AM btw He got out of bed and left me alone for a couple hours. And I did ask him to go to the grocery store and he had an attitude about it and I apologized and told him that I’m not trying to bother him. He didn’t really say anything, but he left me with the baby. He comes home and tells me that he was gonna go to the 5:00 mass since he didn’t get to go this morning. I asked if he could take the baby since I’ve been getting a lot of dizzy spells today from my migraine. And he just had such a nasty attitude that broke my heart. Especially towards our daughter. He said he didn’t want to deal with her and that it would be hard for him to take her to church by himself. I told him that I do it all the time and that it would really help me out. And he just started complaining about how he barely had any time to himself today and all he’s been doing was taking care of our baby.

And I just completely went off on him. I definitely said some things that I kind of regret. I called him every name in the book. And I threw a packet of baby wipes at him. It broke my heart to hear him complain about how he had to take care of our daughter today because I’m sick. Like I physically cannot stand without feeling incredibly dizzy. I felt a lot of anger not only because he complained about taking care of our daughter. But because he got to hang out with his friends last night and he didn’t come home until 1:30 in the morning. And the one time that I ask him to help me take care of her baby because my mom can’t make the 40 minute drive today to help me he has the nerve to complain that he had no time to himself.

He then told me to go F myself, amongst many other things and he picked up my daughter and went to church. There was a lot of yelling involved from him mostly and I just stood there in physical pain, but also emotional because of how sad I am. I’m laying down with a massive headache, writing this in bed. Debating whether or not packing up and going to my mom’s house after he comes back home. I hate that this is my life. This is not what I wanted for myself or my daughter. I know the church doesn’t really believe in divorce, but I’m still thinking about separating. I’m also being very serious about not being open to life with him. I think my husband really loved the idea of being a family man, but doesn’t want to do the work of having a family. And I’m not going to put myself in a situation where I have more kids with a man who doesn’t value me or the child he has now.

If you read all of this, thank you so much. I am open to any criticism that you may have of me or any thoughts on how to help my marriage. I’ve been really clinging to God this past year. But sometimes I feel like my prayers aren’t being answered right now.

Have any of you ever experienced crying after making love or during the act?
I’ve been married for a couple of years now and it happens almost every time. I’ve always felt shy to ask my Spiritual Director, but he went home a couple months ago so in the meantime of finding another, I turn to here to try to find some answers of WHY THIS COULD BE HAPPENING TO ME.
Just a bit of context, it’s not an ugly or a happy cry per se, more of a I need to release it and then say how much I love my husband. So if anyone can shed some light, I grateful for your input🫶

For context me and My bf have been Dating for over 6 years and he wants to marry me, the thing is, is that my mother does not want me to get married and move out because she's extremely controlling. If I told her this news I'm afraid she will get extremely angry at me and flip out on me. To the point where if I had to move out, I'd probably end up homeless because I cannot afford to live on my own.

I'm having a hard time getting married because the priest who wants to marry us needs two signatures from close family or friends. Problem is that I'm struggling to get my family to cooperate with me. My bio dad who is seprated from my mom will not help me go to a notary because he makes a million excuses. My sister will not help me Because she is afraid my mom will be angry at her for helping me

Is this a sign from God that I should not get married? I'm having a hard time getting married

About 4 years ago, I developed an autoimmune disease and had to go gluten free. It sucked, but it wasn't the worst thing in the world. Gluten free substitutes aren't the worst and I like rice and potatoes so it was an easy switch.

Then I had my daughter and gained a significant amount of weight. 2 years postpartum, I still could not get the scale to budge a single pound even with diet and exercise. I got pregnant again and knew that for the sake of this baby, my own health, and the possibility of having another baby in the future, I needed to get to the bottom of it. So I started working with a registered dietician- not to loose weight while pregnant but to make sure I'm balancing getting the baby nutrients with what works for my body. And then we'll look into hormones and weight loss as I start to wean. We collected what data we could and, wouldn't you know it, all trends point to insulin resistance which means I need to go low carb.

The icing on the cake is I'm now being 38 weeks pregnant, have terrible reflux, and every other week it feels like something new is getting recalled. Pair that with a very demanding toddler and a husband who insists I cannot be on screens while she's around me because "she'll look at them." Meal planning has become a whole endeavor. The reflux makes me not want to eat anything, but if I don't eat regularly, my blood sugar starts to dip and I get very cranky very fast.

I'm at the point where I feel like all I'm allowed to have is boiled chicken and greek yogurt.

And does anyone have any help? No. Do they take the toddler so I can meal prep in peace? No. Do they have recipes or productive suggestions? No. Does my husband take the time to find something that tastes good, is quick to make, and checks every dietary box then bring it to me? No. What do people give me? Lectures on how Jesus didn't want to carry His cross. "Think of how hard that must have been for Him. This is your cross. You can embrace it or you can complain about it." They tell me to find the compromise between my health needs and getting the baby calories. But when I haven't meal planned and we're low on groceries, there IS no compromise. Either I eat something that spikes my sugar, I make my reflux worse, or I don't eat anything.

I am tired, hungry, touched out, and overstimulated. I'm so tired of unhelpful "Christian" answers. If you don't have a solution to offer, don't give advice.

The main topic I’m speaking on is modesty with clothing, but I’m also aware that modesty is good for all aspects of life.

It’s been on my mind for a while and I’ve been examining how I dress more closely lately.

It started because whenever I get ready for mass or OCIA I have a hard time finding something proper to wear. All of my dresses are very short, all my pants very tight, and nearly every shirt is tight or cropped.

I read a few articles on modesty by Catholics and it helped me deepen my understanding a lot. One thing that really stood out to me is the idea that our body is for the enjoyment of our spouses only; which also applies to visual enjoyment. Obviously I’m not married yet but he’s receiving the husband title soon so that’s where my mindset is at.

I’m recently engaged and before I met my fiancé I was agnostic at best. I enjoyed wearing less clothes because I enjoyed attention from men. Knowing I was attractive and could get attention made me feel better about myself.

Ever since I met him but especially after our engagement I feel like my body should be for his eyes only. I don’t want to give men the opportunity to feel feelings about me only my fiancé is entitled to. Obviously I can’t prevent everything, men will be men, but the idea really spoke to me.

I also like the idea of just being a bit more conscious of Christ in my daily living. Wearing what I wear for Him instead of my own insecurities or attention. I’ve prayed about this too and the urge is getting stronger.

I talked to my fiancé about it and he’s supportive! He says he thinks it could be a wonderful devotion if I really feel called to it. He took me out to buy some dresses for OCIA and Mass as a start so I could try.

My mom is less supportive and seems very suspicious about it. She seems put off of the whole idea of avoiding male gaze at all, like I’m buying into misogyny.

Am I being weird? I felt better after talking with my fiancé but my mom made me a bit insecure about it.

I'm very curious about how other people approach Confession. How much context do you give? My husband seems to treat it as somewhat of counseling or spiritual direction appointment where he offers a lot of contextual details and looks for guidance, but I feel like the recommendation is to just list sins and number of times, e.g. "I felt envious of friends three times, I lied 2 times, I received the Eucharist when I knew I still needed to go to Confession once" -- no personal details necessary. Just wondering how you all approach this Sacrament. It's one of those things where I wonder if I'm doing it "right," but it's such a private experience that we don't discuss it with people IRL.

My husband and I have been trying for a baby for about 2 years. After lots of testing and 9 medicated/monitored cycles without a single positive test, my doctor said I have only a 2% chance of conceiving naturally. I am completely devastated. Trying not to feel abandoned by God, but am really struggling. Especially when perhaps the only tool that could help (IVF) is forbidden. I am meeting with a NaPro surgeon next month and am trying to keep a little hope alive. Please pray for me.

Hi!

As I do every year, I am leaving in a few days to volunteer in Lourdes. If you want, you can leave your prayer requests here, or DM me, and I will bring everything to the Grotto and our Lady of Lourdes.